Some celebrate it, some dread it. Either way, Halloween gives us a justified opportunity to explore our darker side and use some colour combos that just wouldn’t work at any other time of year.

So that’s just what I did. Out with the toxic green, ghoulish purple, zombie teal and ghostly white and canvas at the ready – time to get zombified!

This project actually started with a bit of an experiment when I was looking at acrylic painting pouring.

The canvas once dried did present me with a challenge as I didn’t feel that it represented that technique well. So it got shelved.

On deciding to create a zombie-selfie I was having a rummage and found it again. Perfect!

The paints that I dug out were the same ones that I’d used to create the background so I was a tad worried that these would disappear into the background so I nabbed the colours that I mentioned earlier in the post – more zombied anyway.

I began by sketching out a rough face shape – loosely bases on my mush – and began to block in some colour.

More blocking was added and a little dry brushing.

Not quite grungey enough for a zombie face though.

Time to shabby this up!

I mixed some of the paint with an acrylic flow medium – a little more than was recommended as I wanted it to have a translucent look and also to ‘bubble’ when I scrubbed it onto the canvas.

That worked well!

Here’s a closer look at the T-Shirt detail.

You may also have noticed that on the face I added a little green glaze around and over the eyes.

Gave them a little more dimension I thought. Do you agree?

A hint of what I did to the beard can be seen in the image above too. Here is the manly waxed tash.

I added it for a touch of class. That worked, lol!

As you saw, I also started adding highlights to areas like the lips, and lowlights to areas like the ears.

Time to let it dry before the next stage.

I actually ended up leaving him be for a few days in which time a spider rang across his face and he gathered a little dust.

When I returned, I knew exactly how to finish it off.

I rummaged the stencil draw and the inkpad box and got to work.

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The ink was heat set as it was going to take too long to air dry.

Time for to see this handsome chaps face in full?

Here you go …

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There we go! Me, only a zombie!

Actually quite proud of this creation. A nice little creative challenge that allowed my mind to wander and explore techniques that I don’t often get to use in my ‘day job’.

What do you think? Too ghoulish or just enough too give the kids a fright?

Thanks, as ever, for stopping by.

I’ll see you again soon hopefully.

J :)